Our mood was not one of despair, which Anthea explained to me was a violent feeling that led to great emotional outbursts, but rather one of equanimity. There were no longer extensive conversations on every subject, nor the nervous jollity of before. During the year when we were building the new village, the women had become animated again, but then they lapsed into the old sluggishness, never hurrying to complete any task, since there were so few that they preferred to draw them out. That made them seem like old women. They had no reason to look up, so they walked with a stoop. The last passions had fizzled out, their hair was going grey and they seemed to have lost the desire to live. We had survived the prison, the plain and the loss of all hope, but the women had discovered that survival is no more than putting off the moment of death. They continued to eat, drink and sleep, while in the shadows, surrender, silent capitulation and death lurked. They became thin, the furrows on their dejected faces grew deeper, they easily became breathless, their hips were painful and their legs swollen. Elizabeth suffered from haemorrhages, Greta stomach pains and Anna became paralysed down one side of her body.

She could no longer speak, one eye was closed and the other begged. We all knew what she was asking, but Anthea, weeping, was unable to grant it.

‘You told me that you’d be able to do it,’ Anthea murmured, not daring to meet my eye.

‘I’ll do it,’ I told her.

I didn’t really understand. If that was what Anna wanted and we could offer her no other relief, why was it so difficult for them to act? I think I understand them now that I have cried, but I can’t be sure, because even though I’ve spent most of my life with them, I am well aware that I was always different. I’m probably missing a chunk of their past.

She had explained everything to me in detail. You had to count the ribs down from the collarbone, then find the edge of the sternum and go back three fingers. She showed me on her own breast the exact spot where I would have to plunge the knife in hard, with a single swift stroke.

‘Then, when it’s my turn, you’ll know what to do.’

They all went out of the house where Anna lay and I was left alone with her. I sat beside her. She looked at me and I saw, on what remained of her face, that she was trying to smile at me. I drew back the blanket from her emaciated chest, and had no difficulty in counting the protruding ribs, nor in locating the edge of the sternum. I placed my finger on the spot and I could feel the beating of her heart, which seemed vigorous. It was certain that if we did not intervene, she could remain the victim of this appalling condition for a long time. She raised the arm she was still able to move and stroked my cheek while I placed on her skin the point of the knife that I had spent ages sharpening. I was swift and accurate, her arm fell back and her heart was beating no more.